Gentle but firm

consciousseekerconsciousseeker
in General

In life, when you keep finding yourself in the situations where your boundaries were crossed, your kindness was taken advantage of -- How to respond gently with kindness while being firm and honoring the relationships?

Any common phrases or methods or ways that helped?

Comments

  • BellaAineBellaAine

    Be kind and gentle to yourself by not tolerating it. Your boundaries are not up for debate. It's a firm NO. As for someone taking advantage of your kindness, you simply walk away or ignore. They aren't worthy of your presence until they value it.

  • pmvinespmvines

    No is a full sentence . Doesn't have to be followed by thank you , or have a qualifier

  • consciousseekerconsciousseeker

    @BellaXochilt @pmvines - thank you for your thoughts on this!

  • [Deleted User]Bluzy (deleted user)

    Here here …

  • VioletblanketVioletblanket

    You leave. If they can’t respect you, you kindly leave.

  • CuddleDuncanCuddleDuncan Mod

    How to respond gently with kindness while being firm and honoring the relationships?

    Don't. They have been neither kind nor honoured the relationship. So, in the moment, you shouldn't either. Even quite nice people - who it's good to have in your life, overall - can interpret kindness as weakness and take advantage of it.

    Sometimes, such people need to be trained how to behave in much the same way as animals need to be trained. What's required is a verbal snap on the nose.

  • AchterbahnAchterbahn

    Kind and gentle can be used if it happens to be a boundary that hasn't been expressed ahead of time. For example:
    "Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot to mention that I have an injury that is healing, so please avoid my right elbow going forward"

    For boundaries that have been made clear previously, kind and gentle isn't necessary. Depending on the severity, some examples:
    "I am not ok with you touching me there. If it happens again, I will end our session"
    Or:
    "That was completely inappropriate and I need you to leave" (or "I'm leaving" depending on who's hosting)

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